


Floor 507

by despairingdignities



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-07
Updated: 2017-07-07
Packaged: 2018-11-29 01:49:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 507
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11430642
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/despairingdignities/pseuds/despairingdignities
Summary: The vault doors slammed shut, and behind her Missy had left the Doctor three things:1.	A dull, hollow ringing in his ears from the sound of the doors closing.2.	A heavy feeling in his stomach – regret? Guilt? Both?3.	A yearning to get inside the vault, hold her, and tell her he was sorry; but also, that it was necessary.He had seen far too much of her vulnerability; her tears, her insecurities, the things of the past that she still clung to for comfort - and now, on the other side of the vault doors, she regretted showing him any of them.





	Floor 507

A simple, seven-word warning.

Not a lot said, in the grand scheme of things; yet hundreds of unspoken thoughts and feelings seemingly lingered just out of reach in her tone, and in the things the Doctor couldn’t see from the wrong side of a vault door.

“If you come in here, I’m leaving.”

Her voice was quiet, upset even – although certainly not timid – but it was also strangely matter-of-fact, cold and detached in an uncomfortably familiar way. Were it not for the heavy emotion that bitterly laced each word, he would have sworn they were back where they had started, oh so long ago. He was more experienced now, and she was…significantly more unkempt than she had been, although that might be mostly his fault.

If he closed his eyes, they were back in that place with the skeletons, the ‘dark water’ and the overly curious Doctor Chang - back when none of these emotions would have mattered to either one of them, because there was no love lost between the pair of old friends.

“Missy, please.” How incredibly, _pathetically_ desperate had he sounded? He could almost hear her internally snickering at his grovelling. “I’m sorry.”

The apology made up for nothing. If anything, her voice got colder, with the impression of dancing on a knife-edge between devastation, and sheer unadulterated anger. A glaring sign that he should be careful where he chose to tread next.

“I mean it. You know I do, and you won’t stop me.” If she gave him an inch, she’d give him a mile before long. They both knew that well enough.

He rested his hand, and then his head, on the cold metal of the doors, sighed because she was right. So terribly, wonderfully right, as always.

Not so long ago he would have stopped her without hesitation, put her back in the vault, and kept his distance. But now? After what he had put her through, knowing how it would affect her? Perhaps he had forgotten that she was far more emotional than she once was, forgotten to factor that in. He often forgot how other people felt in the pursuit of what he thought was right, didn’t he?

“You win,” he muttered. She did. For now. He had a habit of trying, and trying again.

Her response came immediately, she’d picked the four words _deliberately_ \- those four words that were simultaneously so achingly familiar, and yet so different that they tore him apart. Because they came out flat, dejected, nothing at all like her usual triumphant response to winning. “I know.”

Missy was waiting for him to leave, he knew. He couldn’t explain how he knew. There weren’t many things the Doctor couldn’t explain, but Missy – the one person in the universe he truly wanted to understand – was one of them.

So, he prised his head and his hands away from the doors, started to walk away, and pretended not to notice the little sounds of pain and emotion she started letting out when she believed he was gone.


End file.
